Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2011/11/12
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]> From: George Lottermoser <imagist3 at mac.com> > Andreas Gursky's monumentally huge and extremely detailed photographs hold > a > very serious place in the history of photography; and photography's place > within the world of two dimensional visual art. Whether you like his work > or not > remains obviously subjective. Though I'd guess that if you stood before > his > 8' to 20' foot prints you may feel differently. A 300 ppi jpg does not > begin to suggest the experience of standing before the work. Nor does it > begin > help understand? the very intentional use and need for scale; or the body > of > work the man has produced with focused attention over decades. On the strength of your comments, I looked up Gursky... Gursky gets full points for having been there and done the piece, but mostly for mad marketing skillz. (I actually HAVE seen the 99c Store piece, or a life-size version of it .? My first reaction, as with the price tag on this one, was "Damn, that's Big."?? My second reaction, also as with this one, was "WHY?!?"? I subsequently used that photograph along with several Mark Rothko pieces to explain to a small group of artist friends why I refuse to accept the label 'artist' for myself.? The exact phrase was "THIS is why I'll deck you if you ever call me an artist in public again.") Gursky may well be significant within the art world.? I'll let the artists and the art critics, of which I'm NOT one, decide that.? I'm exposed to huge amounts of that world - and I long ago realized that I'm not in the target marketGurskyg? demographic for it.? Oddly enough there DOES appear to be one.? (There's also a huge paying audience for Survivor, all kinds of sports, and politicians.?? There are even insane people who spend ridiculous amounts of money acquiring cameras and rebuilding old race cars, none of which have much redeeming value outside their niches either.) Myself,? I'll stand by what I said, with one modification:? Some technicians were, I suspect, paid handsomely to actually create the physical piece, and that's a good thing for them.? Beyond that.... R. Clayton McKee PhotoJournalist from somewhere just south of somewhere else...